At least 10 people are dead and four more are missing after 16 inches of rain fell in only two hours in the central Italian province of Marche, creating disastrous flooding.
The streets of many cities in the provinces of Ancona and Pesaro-Urbino were inundated by 16 inches of rain that poured within two hours on Thursday night, despite the fact that local authorities had not anticipated such a rapid “water bomb.”
The mayor of the town of Serra Sant’Abbondio, Ludovico Caverni, told RAI state radio, “It was like an earthquake.”
At least 10 persons have been confirmed killed, while four are still missing as of Friday morning, according to RAI state radio.
Two children are among the missing, one of whom was carried from his mother’s arms by raging waves near the town of Barbara.
A girl of around eight years old and another mother are also missing in Barbara after attempting to flee the flood waters, according to local mayor Riccardo Pasqualini.
More than 300 firemen were sent to the location, and film shows them waiting through waist-high water in flooded streets as others operate inflatable dinghies to rescue people.
Dozens of people were rescued by firefighters from vehicles, roofs, and trees, according to tweets. Additionally, helicopters were used to evacuate individuals from isolated communities.
Small communities in the hills around the Renaissance tourist town of Urbino were also deluged by swift-moving torrents of water, mud, and debris that surged through streets in the coastal town of Senigallia.
Firefighters were shown on video traversing the streets of Senigallia while rescuing and evacuating residents, as others sought to clear an underpass of rubble.
Massimiliano Fazzini, a climatologist, said on state television, “It was an extreme event, more than an exceptional one.”
According to his estimates, the quantity of rain that poured during a four-hour period and in especially for 15 minutes was the greatest in hundreds of years.
Stefano Aguzzi, chief of civil protection for the regional administration of Marche, said that the deluge was far more intense than anticipated.
“We were given a normal alert for rain, but nobody had expected anything like this,” he told reporters.
The authorities were cited as claiming that rescue workers were still seeking for survivors in local media.
Fabrizio Curcio, director of the national civil protection agency, was his route to Ancona to evaluate the damage, while party leaders running for the September 25 election extended their support.
Another video shows individuals knee-deep in water while holding umbrellas as the Marche area was ravaged by flooding.
As the rain continues to fall, they are surrounded by flooded automobiles.
As they wade through it, the camera operator pans around to see trash and structures perilously close to the flooding.
People and rescue cars can be seen in the background in footage depicting a massive downpour of debris-laden water crashing onto a structure in Sentino.
Another video shows more torrential downpours flooding the streets of Senigallia as emergency personnel arrive on the scene.
The Marche region’s flooding is part of a spate of storms sweeping the country.
Tuscany, Umbria, Abruzzo, Fruili Venezia Guilia, Lombardy, Liguria, and Molise are also suffering storms.
It is the most recent in a string of extraordinary weather occurrences that have occurred in Italy this summer.
Farmers organisation Coldiretti said Wednesday that this summer’s total of 1,642 is five times that of a decade ago.
The results were given by Coldiretti based on information from the European Severe Weather Database.
The ESWD database includes information about tornadoes, severe rainfall, huge hail, and lightning strikes.
According to Coldiretti, the long, dry summer in Italy was broken by heavy rains.
In addition, it was said that severe weather events cost more than six billion euros in damages to agriculture in 2022, which is equivalent to ten percent of the value of national produce.
The farmer’s association added, “We are before the clear consequences of climate change, where exceptional atmospheric events are now the norm in Italy too, with a tendency towards tropicalisation manifest in more frequent violent events, seasonal shifts, short, intense precipitations, the fast passage from sunshine to bad weather, with significant changes in temperature that compromises crops, with the loss of production and damage to structure and infrastructure in the countryside”.
Meanwhile, the leader of Italy’s center-left Democratic Party (PD) said on Twitter that the party will cease campaigning in the area before to the national election on September 25.